At the Edge of a Fairy Tale
by Hopeful Romantic
Summary: Cinderella isn't the only one with troublesome shoes...


**Disclaimer:** I do not own Bones (insert pithy comment here.) No copyright infringement is intended and no money was made from this of course. Any similarity to any other story not my own is coincidence.

**Title:** At the Edge of a Fairy Tale  
**Genre:** Bones; B&B fluff  
**Rating:** PG; rated for general content  
**Timeline:** Sometime late in season 4  
**Author's Note:** Okay, I certainly only have a general knowledge of anatomy, so if I got the names wrong(places on the foot wrong) please forgive me, and I would definitely like to correct it if anyone wants to drop a note. *grin* I looked up Gray's Anatomy and tried to follow it as best I could, but it was sooooo not my field of study in school.  
The dress referenced, is from a movie poster of Breakfast at Tiffany's  
I'm not entirely certain that ESPN shows the type of program that I claim it did, but *shrug* it did make sense for the story.

* * *

"Hey," I said by way of greeting as I entered the open stairwell and looked up to my partner. "They've been looking for you."

I walked to the foot of the dark, polished wooden steps.

"This little shindig _is_ all for you, you know."

Temperance nodded slightly, but otherwise gave no response, instead slipping the elegant black heel from her left foot with a small expression of discomfort. She dropped it unceremoniously to the step just beneath her, ignoring the clatter it made as it hit wood.

"They don't need me for dancing," she declared with an almost careless certainty while trying to rub out the soreness in her foot with her black gloved hands.

"Yeah, but maybe I do," I replied with a hopelessly cheeky sort of grin that faded slightly at my partner's expression. For a moment, an increasingly familiar tension hummed between us, setting us both on the edge of... _something_... before the sound of Temperance's heel tumbling down the steps made us both startle.

I bent down to pick up the shoe that had landed at my feet.

"Looks like you've lost your slipper there, Cinderella."

I carried the heel back up to my partner, depositing it carefully next to her on the step.

"Though I don't suppose you really look like Cinderella tonight," I said lightly, casually looking my partner up and down. "More like, Holly Golightly," I added, admiring the way she looked in her fitted black evening gown and opera gloves.

"I don't know who that is," Temperance admitted simply.

"You're kidding me, Bones. Audrey Hepburn? _Breakfast at Tiffany's_? _Moon River_?"

I shook my head fondly when I saw no glimmer of recognition in my partner's guileless blue eyes.

"Next weekend, you and me at the _Audian_; I'm taking you to see _Breakfast at Tiffany's_."

Temperance raised a single eyebrow but made no other comment before once more turning her attention back to her aching foot. She winced and I dropped to the step below her.

"Here, Bones."

I reached for her foot before my partner could object.

"Relax," I urged her softly. "Let me help you."

Slowly, she allowed me pull her foot toward my lap, and I took the moment to note how surprisingly fragile and delicate it suddenly seemed cradled in my hands.

"Booth?"

Temperance gave me a measuring sort of look and tried to draw her foot back, but I held it firmly in my grip.

"Relax, Bones," I urged her once again before pressing my thumbs carefully into the tightened muscles along the bottom of her foot. I worked my fingers in slow circles meant to soothe.

"I know what I'm doing," I assured her.

I eased the way into deeper pressure, widening each circle I was making with my thumbs. When I could still feel Temperance trying to pull away from me, I decided on a new approach.

"_Flexor digitorum brevis_," I said softly, naming one of the muscles I was massaging. I slid my left hand down to cradle her heel while my other ran carefully up and down the outside edge of her foot.

"_Flexor brevis minimi digiti_."

I moved the thumb of my left hand against her ankle lightly.

"_Tibialis posterior _and _Flexor hallucis longus_."

I couldn't help but smile at my partner's expression. "I _do _know things, Bones."

I shifted my hands again so that I could work a gentle pressure into the arch of her foot once more. This time, Temperance relaxed into the moment, letting my fingers slide uncontested over smooth black silk.

"And I _do _know what I'm doing," I repeated, teasing her just a little as she sighed with the release of her tension.

"There are 28 bones in the human foot," she offered quickly as if trying to regain some kind of imaginary, intellectual high ground.

I ducked my head a little to hide my smile, but I couldn't help adding, "And 33 muscles."

I felt, more than saw my partner's expression and it made me smile a bit more.

"The Learning Channel?" Temperance asked directly, easily bringing a laugh to my lips.

"There was a special on ESPN," I offered finally after several minutes of Temperance simply watching me with a look that I couldn't quite decipher. "Sports medicine and injuries."

She nodded before wincing slightly as I worked the last of the tension from the ball of her foot before releasing it.

"Here," I directed, indicating that I wanted her other foot.

Temperance swung her foot in my direction and I tried to ignore the fact that as she did so, the split hem of her gown revealed that the silk covering her leg was a gartered stalking. I focused instead on the elegantly simple buckle that rested just above her ankle. I patiently worked it loose, slid the shoe from my partner's foot, and was rewarded with her small sigh of relief.

"These things must be killing you."

I set the heel down next to its mate and felt Temperance shrug slightly.

"Angela insisted that they _worked_ with this dress," my partner replied almost defensively. "And... I didn't think that they'd be this uncomfortable," she confessed quietly.

Her quiet words drew my eyes back up and I couldn't help but once more admire the way that her evening gown suited her, following her lines and curves like an attentive lover's caress.

"Well she's right, Bones. They definitely _do work _with that dress. Of course, I've always had kind of a thing for _Holly Golightly_," I admitted before I could quite stop myself. I froze a moment, but my partner either hadn't heard me, or had mercifully let the comment go. I applied myself to massaging Temperance's sore foot. She sighed.

"Better?"

Temperance nodded and leaned back a little as I traced warm circles into the tension I felt beneath my thumbs. I followed it almost relentlessly, determined to ease all of her aches and pains. Then, with only a small pause, I eased my hands up her calf as well, massaging the tightness I felt there.

She sighed again and I watched as she tilted her head back, eyes closing and lips parting slightly.

"That must have been a very good program, Booth," she commented in a contented sort of voice.

When her next sigh was closer to a soft moan, the thought suddenly hit me like a _Capitals' _enforcer that it was just the sort of sound that I imagined she would make... _when_... And of course, that same ever helpful imagination, readily supplied the images to go with my abruptly libidinous thoughts.

"Booth?"

I found myself looking into my partner's open and curious blue gaze.

"Booth?"

Then I realized that my hands were now lingering lightly near her knee where the split hem of her gown began. And just like that, we suddenly found ourselves back at that edge of... _something._ I realized with startling clarity that moving my hand one direction or the other could either push us over the edge, or hold us back as we were.

I pulled my hand away.

I reached for her heels and helped her put each one on in turn, and if my fingers lingered a little too long, neither of us mentioned it.

I stood and offered her my arm.

"I really do need you," I said softly, knowing that it would have to be enough for now.

Temperance smiled quietly and took my arm, resting her own perfectly in the curve of mine as we walked back to the party...

_**FIN**_


End file.
